Recently, nonwoven fabrics have come to be used as a base for a compress in place of cotton flannel. Nonwoven fabrics are lower in price than cotton flannel and have good flexibility, and therefore, are suitable for use as such a base. Since they have comparatively high air permeability, however, nonwoven fabrics present a problem in that the medicament applied is apt to bleed through the back of the base. One approach considered to overcome this difficulty is to increase the weight per unit area of the nonwoven fabric. Naturally, however, this approach will involve higher price and lower flexibility, thus diminishing the advantages of the nonwoven fabric.
Bleeding of the medicament is attributable to the presence of openings formed by and among the component fibers of the nonwoven fabric. Moreover, nonwoven fabrics presently used have a substantial number of large openings per unit area.